It was too easy, really.
Thor wasn't a thinker; he wasn't a planner; he was simply a hand behind a hammer.
He was muscle, nothing more.
At first, Loki had thought that was what Steve was. Simply the muscle. But Steve Rogers was more than the muscles; it was his alter-ego, the righteous and worthy Captain America that was simply the muscles. Steve was the righteous man; the ever-polite, kind man; he was the brains, he was the heart. He was the man that Loki had put behind a glass cage in his head.
Every dead Avenger thus far had been more of a test to see how under his control the Captain really was.
But this would be the fun part. Seeing the very last of Steve Rogers die would come with the deaths of Thor and Tony.
"BROTHER, WHY HAS IT COME TO THIS?"
"I was never your brother. And it was always meant to come to this."
The fight began, and Loki, for the first time in a long time, felt like he was at ease. His brother was about to die, and he felt at peace.
"YOU TOOK SOMETHING YOU HAD NO RIGHT TO. STEVE SHOULD HAVE BEEN WITH THE MAN OF IRON. THEY BELONG TOGETHER."
"Are you so sure, brother? The Captain made a deal with me: he would be my willing weapon in exchange for returning to where he belongs." Loki swept Mjolnir out of Thor's hands, one blow flattening his brother back against the wall. "Why would he kill the person he belongs with?"
Thor was taken aback, his rage confused and sputtering; his will turning in on itself with the thought that Steve could commit such an atrocity.
The truth of it was, Loki didn't care that the only person that understood him was the man raising the god-killer behind his brother's back; it didn't matter that Cap was a creation that Loki had poured himself into.
True, the rage he felt might be more understandable from the eyes of Dr. Banner; perhaps even Tony himself, the misunderstood and downtrodden mad that he was, but it didn't matter. They were not nearly as...entertaining as Captain Steve Rogers.
Captain Rogers, the epitome of goodness and strength in the ranks of those worthless "super" humans, was the most challenging man to comprehend. Tony was made up of genius and hurt: he'd been neglected and abused, bullied and tortured until he'd just shut off; Tony was a man who'd remade himself-only, unlike Loki, he'd made himself into someone to be admired rather than destroyed. That a man of pure goodness could love someone like Tony was a mystery to him. More of a mystery was how a man like Steve could exist at all. How could a man so good and right stand to live with such flawed specimens of life?
Loki knew his obsession with the corruption of the pure and good Steve Rogers bordered on the suicidal. He knew Steve was good and pure and really couldn't be trusted. But a man touched by the pain and loss and death that Steve had been touched with was a man divided. And that division was the only weakness Loki needed to completely sever Steve Rogers from the darkness in his heart that came from the abandonment and the blood.
Thor stopped short on his swing, his features twisting as he felt the pain of the blade running him through. Loki's only regret was that he couldn't wield that blade himself without his powers stripped. It almost would have been worth it.
"WHAT DID I DO TO YOU, BROTHER?"
"I was never your brother! I was one of your playthings. Entertaining and useless. You never saw me as anything different!"
A tear coursed down Thor's cheek, on his knees and bleeding out before Loki's eyes, "YOU...WERE MY BROTHER."
Loki looked up to the man he would make a god if given the chance. He wondered if Cap would be for him what Steve would have been for the Avengers; for Tony. He wondered if he'd at last found his equal, his companion.
Trapped in his own mind, Steve screamed and fought, weaker every time those horrible moments of his past replayed.
He was losing it all.
He'd ruined it all.
If there was anything he'd learned that could keep him standing, it was pain. Steve knew pain; had felt agony for so long that he almost had to wonder if he wasn't slowly going numb from it.
But it wasn't enough. The pain just made the darkness more powerful, and Steve was slipping further away from the surface until he wouldn't even be a memory anymore.
The worst were the memories of the fight that had brought that darkness out.
It'd had to be a real fight between him and Tony. A real hurt he had to inflict on his lover. He'd even tried to negate the pain; to express the lie before he'd begun letting it pour from his mouth like blood or bile.
Tony hadn't let it stand.
...Tony had kissed him quiet, told him that he knew. He knew it all. He'd always know Steve's heart; Steve's head.
Tony had kissed him quiet. Tony had held him. Had touched him. He'd lost himself in Tony's smile and his body and his voice, calming and steadying like nothing Steve had really experienced before.
Tony had marked him, so fleetingly, but it had been there. On his collar, on his hip. He'd been Tony's. A whispered 'always' against his pelvis when he'd said those words.
There was so much madness in that thought. So much of the hurt Steve had dealt them both just by denying the anger that fuelled him and filled him at all he'd seen.
He'd been Tony's. Tony had been his.
...He still was. Steve was still Tony's, and Tony would always be Steve's.
With that thought; that piece of madness, and the knowledge that Tony wouldn't give up on him, Steve fought anew.
It was difficult and Steve felt fragile, like pushing any further would break what little of Steve Rogers there was left.
He couldn't and shouldn't be loved. He wasn't capable of loving-
The memory of Tony's broken hand on his arm, caressing his cheek; even half-dead and hurt because of Steve, Tony's love called through anything and everything else. Tony loved him.
"I trust you…" Tony's voice came from his aching heart, a dart of light and hope in his head, smashing at the cage that held him. "I love you…" Steve seethed, and Steve let everything in him break and rebuild. He wasn't a soldier; Tony was right about that. They weren't soldiers. They were warriors; they were lovers; they were Avengers. And Steve Rogers would be damned if anyone dared to lock him in the ice again.
Tony had told him that Steve was his sanity when he'd nearly lost it. It was only right that the converse would be true, and Steve knew Tony well enough to know that Tony would go out fighting for him.
Tony didn't move when Steve knelt down in front of him. He was lost somewhere, somewhere Steve almost thought he wouldn't be able to get to. "Tony?"
Loki had sent him to kill Tony. The genius may have been rendered all-but useless with every death that tore and shredded at him, but there was always a chance, with Tony, that he'd overcome even the insurmountable odds.
"Tony, please, come back to me. I'm so sorry, Tony. Just, please, be here…"
Steve took Tony's cheek into his hand, the other on Tony's folded arms. Leaning forwards slowly, Steve pressed his lips to Tony's softly, a kiss to end the curse, but all it brought him was Tony's sharp, furious eyes; Tony's whole body trembling under his touch, and tears coursing from Tony's eyes.
For a moment that almost crushed Steve Rogers, he thought Tony wouldn't forgive him.
"What have I done to you?" Tony rattled out, and Steve was in shock; it was the only explanation. Clint's gun was in Tony's hand, then in his mouth, and he'd pulled the trigger before Steve could do more than scream and fall to his knees once more.
"No...No, no, no, no…Tony, no. NO!" The scream was broken-beyond broken. It was the most pain Steve had ever, ever felt. It wasn't human anymore. He wasn't human anymore. He was a wounded animal, just like Loki had made him to be. Only instead of his mark being his family, it was god now. Steve's grip on the hilt of a god-killing sword tightened, his body almost sick with his hatred.
Loki would pay.
"For your service, Steven; I am a man of my word. I will give you the world in which you belong."
Alright, so. Thank you for all your wonderful (and sometimes angered) reviews.
This is where the storm ends, and things start to grow and sunshine starts to happen again (in other words, please don't kill me yet).
Um, just FYI, this is all unbeta'd, so all mistakes and fuck-ups are totally mine, throughout the whole story.